


Blanket Shields and Flashlight Swords

by Doxi



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-07
Updated: 2013-01-07
Packaged: 2017-11-24 00:05:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/628022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Doxi/pseuds/Doxi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Several years after the events of Rise*, Jamie Bennett calls for the Boogey Man in an attempt to set things right.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blanket Shields and Flashlight Swords

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Omegle Chat Log](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/15383) by Me/Stranger. 



> I'm basing this ficlet off an RP I had over Omegle, you can read the original chatlog here; http://logs.omegle.com/ac765ec
> 
> It's very similar I've just expanded it a bit, and added a little more depth here and there. To whomever played Jamie, I want to thank you. I shoulda stayed and got your name but I am so shy.

It had been a few years since Jamie Bennett had met the guardians. A few years since the beings of childhood fantasy were confirmed real, where they gathered around him and told him of their secret order, of how they came to be and what they stood for. Each one, someone else at one time chosen by the man in the moon for some trait they embodied. It was this little fact that had struck Jamie then when he was just a boy, and struck him now not quite a boy anymore but still full of belief. It took a long time to figure out why such a thing nagged at him for so long. Eventually he realized why. 

Jamie Bennett sat on the edge of his bed. His feet use to dangle over the edge now they both rested with ease on the floor. He stared down at his toes, wiggling them against the carpet, then slowly slipped off his bed. Flashlight in hand he flicked it on and peered under his bed, there was nothing there apart some old books and a show box which contained a few collectible cards, some cool marbles, and arrow heads he'd found by the creek.

No monsters lurked there. 

“Hello?” Jamie's brow furrowed as he turned the light about slowly, checking the dark secret recesses under his bed. Nothing answered back. Licking his lips the boy sat up, pointing the flashlight off at a far wall. 

“Pitch?” He asked his empty room and wasn't sure if it would work. Even when he'd call out for the other Guardians they rarely if ever answered him. The boy's shoulders slumped as he clicked off his flashlight.

“That all depends on who calls.” A voice spoke in a soft susurrus of a whisper somewhere near his closet. 

Jamie gasped and flailed. His back pressed against the edge of his bed and the flashlight lifting like a weapon to point the beam of light into the darkness. There was nothing there. Jamie swallowed down the lump in his throat and slowly got to his feet. 

“Jamie Bennett calls...I suppose.” He couldn't stop the nervous falter in his voice. Edging step by step, holding his flash light close like a spear to jab a hidden monster he crept to the closet. 

“Aah, young Jamie,” The voice was behind him now, more defined and sure. More real than it had been. Jamie spun on his heel and stared into the shadows of his room, the circle of light on the farthest wall shivering just slightly. “How could I forget?”

“Glad you haven't forgotten me. Heh.” One more lump swallowed down, to steady his shaking hands. 

What happened next did not happen suddenly, or gradually. It simply became, like finding one's missing car keys in a spot that had been checked a thousand times over only for the keys to become visible, Jamie became aware of a shape. The shape of a tall, narrow man, whose angular shape was accented by the scant light of a street lamp outside. 

The boogie man stood tall and proud in the dark corner of his room, looking down his hatchet like nose at the boy like a predator ready to strike. 

“I doubt I will ever forget you.” Pitch sneered. Jamie could see the glint of his snaggled teeth in the light, and slowly turned his flashlight towards the figure. All at once, Pitch was gone. The voice however, remained, creeping steadily around the room at what sounded like baseboard level. “What is it you want, boy? I can't think of a reason you of all people would want to talk to the boogie man. And turn off that flashlight. Have some manners.”

Jamie blinked, peering down to the orange plastic tube in his hands. He'd been trailing the voice with the beam of light, just barely catching glimpses of something crawling about in the corner of his eyes. His thumb shifted to click it off, blinking his wide eyes in the darkness. 

“Sorry.” He mumbled, setting the flashlight atop his dresser drawers. The boy frowned and nervously rubbed the back of his neck. “That's why I called you, actually. To...apologize. For everything that happened back then, with the others.” He turned slowly in place, only to find that Pitch was looming quietly behind him. Jamie jumped back a few inches, arms pinwheeling about to catch his balance. The Nightmare king craned his neck, peering down at Jamie from one eye.

“Apologize?” Pitch asked, repeating the word as though it were some strange foreign creature he'd never encountered. Jamie collapsed onto his backside by his bed with a soft huff. 

“Uhm, yeah.” Jamie winced, wobbly getting to his feet again. “You act like no one's ever apologized to you before.” The boy raised an eyebrow, trying not to visibly cower under the dagger like gaze of the fallen guardian before him. Pitch's expression turned to one of humor and he let out a low rueful laugh.

“I am the bringer of fear, you know.” Slowly the narrow shadowed figure began to pace about the room, inspecting each element as though he did not trust it. “No one apologizes to me.” Jamie watched the man pace around him, noting that despite the small room Pitch kept his distance.

“You don't believe me.” Jamie said simply, “Which, I completely understand. I do. I'm friends with the guardians, but that doesn't mean I can't think for myself. I thought a lot about it growing up. What you did...” 

Silence flooded between them. Pitch turned his gaze as if to inspect the bookshelf he loomed in the shadow of, but it was clear his true intention was to ignore the boy. Jamie cleared his throat and sheepishly continued.

“I think, maybe, you were hurt and lonely.” Jamie flinched back as Pitch's attention snapped back to him. “And, maybe what I did- what we did, didn't help that.” Pitch lofted one brow, his head tipping rather hazardously to the side.

“You've called me here to mock me!” This was said with clear self assurance. Once more the former king of bad dreams let out a bitter laugh. “Don't be an idiot, I thrived in terror, in fear. Hurt, loneliness; a man like that does not know such things.” 

Jamie raised his hands in a small defensive gesture.

“I could totally be wrong. Just. That's what I thought, I didn't mean for it to offend you or anything.” He shifted uncomfortably, managing an awkward smile for just a brief moment in hopes it would smooth things over. “I just, wanted to apologize all the same. For how we treated you.”

Pitch had begun to hunch forward, lowering his head so that he was eye level with Jamie despite being across the room. He looked like a buzzard perched there in the shadows and his wide eyes stared back with their pale glints of gold. 

“An apology cannot undo the centuries of-! Of humiliation! Of disgrace!” Pitch drew himself up once more, standing as tall and proud as a general commanding an army. “What you may have thought, what you assumed I feel, is all just some little ploy to make you feel better.” His voice had began growing in anger, blossoming into an angry bellow of rage. “It cannot reverse the fact that because of you and your friends my night mares have turned against me! And now you call out to me, to apologize!?” His eyes which had narrowed in rage widened drastically, and the whole of the fallen guardian seemed a black writhing mass of shadows.

Jamie flinched and turned his head away from the Pitch. His teeth gritted and eyes screwed shut but he did not crumple and tuck himself away from the verbal onslaught. He stood his ground and when silence regained he cracked on eye to peer back at Pitch. The shadowy figure had dissipated into the shadows of the room so that only his wide eyes seemed to remain floating there in the darkness. 

“You could have forgotten,” Pitch managed in a hoarse whisper, “that would have been easier.”

Jamie sighed in defeat. He raised his hands from his sides and turned his palms upwards in a shrug. 

“I could have forgotten, I get that. I guess it would have been easier, but...” He looked back to Pitch, his brows furrowing as he studied the man in how he went from boiling rage to absolutely no emotion within an instant. He looked like nothing more than a shadow. “Look, you don't have to accept my apology. I honestly didn't expect you to, but it's there, alright? It may not mean much but,” He looked up with Pitch with such child like eyes. “I dunno, I believe in you.”

Pitch's eyes softened briefly and searched Jamie's face as though there was some secret to be pried there, but just as quickly as it had come it was gone. Replaced by the narrowing of his eyes and the sharpening of his features. His form shrunk back and seemed to curl in on itself. 

“You think you do me a kindness.” He said in a low voice. “The belief of one boy, the last hope of a fallen guardian. Yes, let him wander the rest of his days existing only to one boy.” The darkened figure's voice dropped to a hopeless whisper. “I did not mean it would be easier for you had you forgotten.”

Jamie's eyes narrowed uncertainly. 

“You want to be forgotten?” He asked softly, but quickly lifted his hands and shook his head. “No, never mind. Forget I asked, it's none of my business.” He slumped back onto his bed and sighed, resting his elbows on his knees. “I wanted to apologize, but I think I made things worse.” The shadowy form of Pitch continued to watch him from a distance. Jamie just stared sadly at his feet. “I'm not trying to make it seem like I can fix everything, I just thought...” but the boy trailed off. 

Pitch's form, what was left of it in the darkness, shifted in something of a shrug. 

“You have a child's hope still.” He admitted after a moment of silent study, “The other's have done their job well.” He seemed to shuffle about in the dark, finding something to perch himself on so that he could sit clover to the boy and regard him fully. The only thing that stood out amidst the black were his eyes. Just the barest hint of a gaze in the dark, the same gaze that seemed to peer out of darkened closets and from behind half opened doors. 

Jamie scratched his fingers through his shaggy brown hair. Occasionally he glanced to where Pitch lurked, catching brief hints of gold among the darkness that sent a faint shiver through him. It was easy to imagine those eyes belonging to some monster from his boyhood nightmares. He thought of the times after the battle that he'd seen the guardians. Jack most of all, the others less and less. He was getting older, not quite a child anymore, but not an adult. That awkward middle ground where he would have to chose what he still believed in, and what he should let fall to the wayside as childish fancy. His expression screwed up in momentary distress. 

“There's still people who believe in you.” He mumbled. “Kids are still afraid of the boogey man. It's just, well, they grow up. Everyone grows up, but there's always children.” He looked back to his hands, unsure where he was going with this.

“Yes. There is always children.” Pitch admitted. His form becoming more tangible in the shadows so that his slender hands and long face could be seen. He turned his hands over, exposing his palms in a simple gesture of defeat. “But what I am now? Without half of my powers? I am easily defeated by night light, by half opened hallway doors, by...” He paused, his lips peeling back in a sneer. “Teddy bears. I am a mockery of what I once was. Don't worry children, parents say, the boogey man is not real. There there, my little ones, it was only a bad dream. Nothing more.”

Jamie didn't know what to say this time. The blank drawing in his mind, formed visibly on his expression. Lost and without hope of finding any comforting words, and now questioning the purpose of calling Pitch here at all. He stayed quiet for sometime before he finally let out a loud sigh.

“Okay, you're probably going to hate me for this, but just hear me out.” He rose from the bed, taking a few tentative steps towards the shadowy figure. “Your center. Maybe at your center, you're something more than fear and darkness.” He paused, gauging how Pitch would react to this, but the gleaming eyes in the dark just stared back. “Maybe that's why kids can't stay afraid of you.” Jamie continued with new found enthusiasm. “Yeah, sure you bring nightmares and bad dreams, but what if there's something more to you, like-”

“Like what?” Pitch asked, his voice level without emotion. Jamie faltered.

“I...” His enthusiasm evaporated. “I don't know. Pitch stared through the dark with a world weary expression.

“There is nothing more.” He said this simply, his expression hinting that perhaps he'd had this same argument many times over. Perhaps he had, only with himself. “A shadow is a shadow. A simple absence of light. Vanquished by blanket shields and flashlight swords.” He propped his head in his hand, shoulders dipping down. “When you peer within there is nothing inside a shadow except perhaps, a chair with a coat thrown over it.” 

Pitch's lips formed a tight line.

“That's what I am now, Jamie. A tree branch in a street light, a pile of unwashed clothing, a vacuum under the stair case. Inside there's....” He touched briefly at his chest, curled his long fingers and then tipped the skyward as if releasing something to the night. “Nothing.”

Jamie scowled and shook his head. 

“You say you're just this shadow, just this image reflecting on walls and hallways but I don't think you are! A shadow is like..” The boy stopped, fumbling for the words. “It's like an outline of a bigger picture! Maybe... Maybe you just don't remember that, or you haven't seen it that way!” Jamie smiled despite himself, looking hopefully at the other man. “I don't know who you were before you became this, but there's got to be something more than you're giving credit for!”

Pitch was silent, but his head listed to one side to eye Jamie critically, without any real hate or rage behind it. “Without the Night mares and Fearlings, I am nothing but a specter. There's nothing more for me to remember I have been Pitch...” He looked slightly past Jamie towards some far middle distance where his gaze became uncertain. “For as long as there was a mind in me to remember. This is all there ever was.” The words did not have the same assurance as his other statements had, but he looked back to Jamie. Slowly he pushed himself back up from his perch standing tall and proud as anything.

“I cannot diminish your belief.” Pitch's expression sharpened, but held no real anger. “I tried that once, and we both know how that ended. Your's is a foolish belief, the hope of a child. How lucky you are to have that still.”

Jamie's smile turned to a small frown. His posture did not sag, he tried to stand just as straight as Pitch was. Pitch stood so straight and rigid, almost like a soldier or a statue. Jamie wondered how many centuries he stood alone in the dark, just letting time pass by. What a lonely thought. He locked his gaze with Pitch.

“I'm just stubborn, I guess.” The boy managed another small smile, “I also have this habit of trying to see the good in everything. You can't really escape that.” He held his smile a bit longer, then it faltered as Pitch's gaze did not change. “...You can leave, if you want. If I'm bothering you.”

The silence between them ran on for such a long time. Pitch stood with his hands laced primly behind his back, his eyes staring down through the dark at the boy before him.

“If there is one thing I am to teach children now?” He stepped forward. Each movement measured and tentative, as if he feared the boy in this room more than anything else in all the world. “Is that at times, there is nothing more than darkness. Nothing more than fear, or loneliness, or anger.” It seemed as though he would pass Jamie by completely, but he stopped at the boy's side and laid a large thin hand upon Jamie's shoulder. He stared down, with an almost fatherly gaze. “May you never have to accept that Jamie. I am no longer a guardian. I am, regrettably, a reality.” 

Jamie did not flinch as Pitch laid his hand on his shoulder. He could only look up at the man with a sad smile. “But, that's thing. In reality there's never just darkness. No matter how painful, or lonely it seems. There's always something there to pull you up.” He thought back to the times of darkness in his own life, though few and perhaps not earth shaking dreadful, but there had always been something there. His mom, Sophie, the guardians, his friends. “You're right, I'm not going to accept that. Not about the world, not about you.”

Carefully, the boy reached up and placed his hand over Pitch's. He hated that he found himself surprised to find it was not cold or clammy. It was as warm as his own hand, and just as tangible. 

“It's really sad that you've accepted that about yourself.”

Pitch stared down at the boy's hand, but did not pull his away. 

“Yes.” He said simply. His voice dropping to a whisper.

For a brief fleeting moment, Pitch's expression softened completely and he seemed to recognize something as he stared back at the boy looking up to him. Some long distant and forgotten thing. Pitch blinked a few times, straightened and gave a stiff nod of his head.

“I try not to stay in one place too long,” he began, “And I fea-”

He paused, his gaze turning up suddenly to stare into the shadows of the room. Jamie followed Pitch's gaze but saw nothing, though he thought he heard the soft thudding of swiftly approaching hooves. Pitch shifted as though he meant to draw back from Jamie, but stood his ground. 

“I may have overstayed my welcome.” Pitch looked back to Jamie, urgency his in expression. His form began to melt back into the shadows, but the hand remained on Jamie's shoulder. A firm squeeze was the last tangible sensation that Pitch was even there. Jamie, glanced back once more, hearing some strange rustling in the shadows.

“May morning find you well...”

Jamie turned back, his mouth opened to speak, but Pitch was not there. There was nothing at all in his room besides himself and a chair with a coat slung over it.


End file.
